Once back in the Garden, the red window of the system reappeared in front of him, surprising him slightly and intriguing him just as much. He then stopped in his flight and stepped back again. From a certain moment, the window disappeared again, blurring.
He retried several times in a row before seeming to question himself. Were the windows he saw part of the Garden's functionality as well? The most plausible origin was quite possibly the rune of logic.
Earlier in the week, Isaac had attempted to inspect the latter, but it looked extremely long and complex, almost more complex than the rune of regeneration woven by the roots of plants.
After several days, he had decided to wait a little longer before leaning into it. It was quite possible that the windows that so often appeared in front of him were actually an interface created by the rune of logic.
Isaac wasn't sure, but what he did know was that once outside the rune's area of influence, he would no longer have access to the Garden systems and therefore access to golems or to runes. He mentally noted that he had to find a solution to this in the future and then proceeded to the edge of the high plains to tackle the immediate problem he had.
Isaac had been thinking for a long time about what he should do with relationships on the outside. Should he venture out and explore incognito or try to make himself known in the hope that someone he knows or someone who knew the previous Admin could find him.
However, his discussion with the group of people gave him new information that he hadn't quite taken into account.
The "Lockdown" arcane he had used to lock the group in and prevent them from escaping was actually a copied version of the protection rune he had inspected using the system. The principle was simple and was based mainly on the magic of the wind, however, the rune did not allow any passage.
Neither air, nor person or object could pass. From a technical standpoint, what the rune did was freeze the air in place in a certain place. Like water molecules slowing down to stop moving and forming a solid block from a liquid, the same principle was applied to air.
All the gases in the air at a certain location were suspended in motion and all of their kinetic energy was absorbed, creating a wall that was slightly transparent like ice. Once the wall is created it prevents any other particle from entering as long as the rune is powered. Any material larger than the suspended particles will be blocked.
If a particle or molecule were to penetrate between the links of the barrier, the latter will freeze the intruder's movements, causing it to join the transparent wall. It was quite an ingenious method, but it still had its downsides.
Firstly, it did not protect from waves and radiations but only from particles. Also, although a physical attack is totally countered, fire attacks for example could partially pass through. Although the fire in itself would not pass the barrier, the heat being in the end the rapid movement of the particles would be nullified by the wall, the infrared radiating from the flames could pass.
In fairly large quantities, therefore, it was theoretically possible to cook a person hidden inside a barrier by covering it with fire.
The second disadvantage was that the barrier ignored friend or foe identification or direction of movement. It was blocking everything and so it was impossible to get out or enter it by anyone, even its creator.
However, Isaac had not yet had time to analyze the entire rune of protection, more than 70% still to be studied, the latter measuring well about thirty meters in diameter at sight. It was therefore certain that in addition to this functionality, the rune had additional functions to help protect the Garden.
One of which Isaac was eager to find out that lay in mana freezing. As such, the golden ray he created before was actually a concentration of manicle. Based on this principle, he had already tried his arcane beforehand to freeze manicles in the hope of finding a spell that could prevent an explosion of this kind from happening again.
Because of this, Isaac was certain that among the many lines of the enormous rune of protection there was a function to block manicles and energies from passing through.
For now, he had first of all to think about an important question: What was he going to do. If he decided to stay a little longer to continue his research and experimentation, he was sure that by then the news would be scattered enough that the two border kingdoms would suddenly become interested in the Garden.
All the more in view of the reactions of the scouts who seemed to see a kind of noble. He wasn't sure yet how technologically developed this world was, but looking at the clothes of the people he had met, he would probably place it on a medieval level. Like every fantastic world seems to be.
While such a stereotype is recurrent in books and movies, it was not entirely illogical. Indeed, a society that would have access to magic based on emotions, sensations and natural energy would not have so much advantage in destroying their environment.
In the modern world, Humanity had decided to develop technologies, extract materials and resources from its environment to build and change their world. But in a magical world, the behavior should be relatively the opposite. Since magic is obviously a part of life and of the world, it would not be wise to destroy the environment.
On the other hand, there was also a certain kind of complacency on the part of individuals. Why try anything else if this path seems promising? Magic was a gift in itself and was useful and functional. Why venture into the realm of modern technology when such a tool was available?
In a medieval age where ideas originate from the High Aristocracy, Nobility and Royalty, it was clear that the people would follow the orders of their superiors as long as it was beneficial to them. On the side of the superiors, why deprive themselves of the gift of magic which gives them an advantageous hand over the people?
It all seemed logical to Isaac's mind.
However, it was also a problem for him. When the news reached the superiors of each kingdoms, it was certain that researchers, mages and even entire armies would be moved to collect what the Garden possessed.
In a magical world, magical knowledge should be paramount after all for a kingdom. It would be the equivalent of military technology in the modern world.
What's more, it would appear that the barrier is shared knowledge and known from the scouts' statements. And since they treated the Garden as a sanctuary, therefore an inviolable and sacred place, he was sure that they considered it something important, perhaps even divine.
Isaac didn't want to manage armies. Although the Garden was protected by the protection rune that he could activate at any time but had decided to keep it down for now, he didn't really want to reactivate it right away.
He wasn't sure he could walk through when it is up. It was therefore possible that by activating it, he would cut himself off again from the world and be unable to exit without deactivating the rune again so as not to be able to reactivate it for 8 days.
To overcome this, he therefore had to find an active defense. Although the Garden golems and those he created had the capabilities for this, they were mostly prepared for short to medium range defense, with the defense golems' rays reaching no farther than a hundred yards before they disintegrate.
So he had to think of a new defense, but this time an offensive defense. After all, as Napoleon said: "The best defense is attack."
And he had already found an idea. To be more precise, it was the Geloms who gave him the idea. He then headed for the center of the High Plains. With a wave of his hand, three gray arcana appeared on the ground before rock began to form in the air.
Large boulders of about three meters slowly formed in front of him as he cracked his fingers before starting to draw runic lines across the surface of the boulders. On the three rocks, large blue runes then took shape before glowing.
The rocks began to quickly contract, shatter and reform before beginning to take on a humanoid form with two arms, two legs and a head. Mana circuits began to form around the runes inscribed on the head, and three new golems formed before Isaac's focused eyes.
Once done, he inscribed four wind propulsion runes, one on each feet and hand of the golems. Once that was done, he turned around and created a new rock in a conical shape with a pointed face and the flat opposite, this time about one foot in diameter.
On the flat surface, he inscribed a rune of wind and on the other, a rune of fire on the pointed surface and finally a rune of logic on the surface between the two faces. Once all three runes were written, Isaac checked it before walking away a bit after infusing mana into the logic rune.
After a few seconds, the logic rune then activated and injected energy into the wind rune which expelled a jet of wind, suddenly propelling the pebble rapidly skyward. About two seconds later, it was already 300 meters in the sky when it exploded. A wave of fire then filled the sky and smoke began to disperse.
With a slight smile on his face, Isaac was happy with his experience, but not yet satisfied. During its ascent, the stone had deviated slightly from its intended path. This was most likely due to fluctuations in wind or mana in the rune's power supply.
- "It has to be accurate if I want it to be reliable," he said simply before starting to correct the mistakes.
When Isaac finished his "high explosive shell", the sun was already high in the sky. Night had passed and day had risen with bursts of explosion in the Garden. The deafening sound of shells echoed across the plains as Isaac watched as he took mental notes before continuing to correct errors in the logic circuits of the runes.
After this work and once satisfied, Isaac then turned to the three new golems he had created. He then began to create a new white rune on the chest. After several tens of minutes, he seemed satisfied with the rune and walked away again slightly.
He displayed the system interface before speaking.
- "Shoot that tree" he said pointing to a tree on the edge of the forest.
Immediately, the golems started to move and turned to face their target. Energy then began to focus on the rune placed on their torso, radiating white light before a pebble appeared in front of it.
Moments later, three runes traced across the pebbles before suddenly, the wind rune behind it activated, propelling the projectile forward. Three shells hit the poor tree before three explosions rang out.
Isaac returned his attention to the tree, a smile on his face. At the point of impact, a crater about 5 meters in diameter was visible with flames which were quickly extinguished by a fine humid rain that appeared around.
He had already gotten used to this rain during his experiments. These were the maintenance golems taking over to repair the damage done. Once the flames were extinguished, the regeneration rune would take over and the tree would likely be back after a few hours.
Without waiting, Isaac then began a massive production and a dozen arcana appeared one by one on the ground as golems began to build, runes forming on their surface. All this under the serious and concentrated gaze of Isaac, a slight smile on his face showing his excitement and impatience.